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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29971374">Equinox</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/AdelaCathcart/pseuds/AdelaCathcart'>AdelaCathcart</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>His Dark Materials (TV), His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman, The Book of Dust - Philip Pullman</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, F/M, New Beginnings, Pre-Canon, Resentment, Romance, misery fic for the plague year</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-16 03:14:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,280</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29971374</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/AdelaCathcart/pseuds/AdelaCathcart</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He had to admire her nerve, lying to his face about a matter of public record. She had placed glittering tears in her eyes the way other women wore diamonds, and trained them on him knowing they would cut. He thought of backing her over the red-lacquer handrail, of biting her throat and pinching her breasts and forcing her to cling to him or fall. Perhaps she hoped to goad him into doing this. He might have put an end to loving her, he thought with a familiar wave of despair, but nothing on heaven or earth would make him stop wanting her.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Lord Asriel/Marisa Coulter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>30PlusFanfic Vernal Equinox Prompt Challenge</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Equinox</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">He left England during the flood and stayed away a year, nursing his broken heart in the arms of a witch or a shaman, avoiding anyone who could lay a claim to him. He spent the summer in Beringland, the fall in Tungusk, and winter in Lapland, pointedly ignoring the dates on the calendar until he was sure Lyra’s birthday had passed, and the anniversary of the murder, and Christmas, and the New Year. Only when he saw by the lengthening days that it was Candlemas did he arrange to return home—to whatever scraps of home still remained.</p><p class="p1">Another man might have dwelt the inevitable reunion, or even prepared some cutting remark, but Asriel had always been blessed with the gift of forgetting. While he was gone she was as good as dead to him. On the rare occasions when he did think of her he vaguely imagined she had died, in an accident or some newer, uglier scandal, and if he only stayed away long enough he wouldn’t even be expected to attend the service. He need never face her at all. So when he did see her at last, lovely as ever and happier than she had any right to be, he was utterly blindsided: it was like seeing a ghost.</p><p class="p1">She was in long, cream-colored satin, like a taper with a head of flame, and she was laughing, actually laughing, with a carefree innocence befitting her youth, as if she had not ruined every person who’d ever tried to love her. He thought that he had rinsed her from his blood, but he now discovered to his disgust that his eyes were desperately hungry for her, and he was not much in the habit of curbing his appetites, so with resignation Stelmaria herded him behind the cover of a stand of potted ferns. At least he still had the self-control to walk away.</p><p class="p1">The fury he’d outrun all these long months had caught up to him at last. He could feel its scorching breath upon his neck. After her husband’s death, Asriel had heard, she’d placed her ambitions entirely in the Church, and by all accounts excelled in that den of treacle-dripping vipers. The children she manipulated into doing her dirty work must adore her, he thought bitterly. Any child, and most adults, would be defenseless against such sweetness and such beauty. Even now her new admirers were hovering, empty-headed moths who would soon be charred to cinders. He thought of throwing a table into them.</p><p class="p2">“Here she comes,” Stelmaria warned him, and stupidly he looked directly at the woman and she saw. If he retreated now it would be her victory, so he could only stride boldly up and face her. The moths had dispersed.</p><p class="p1">“Asriel!” she said, smiling radiantly, if there were no one else on Earth she’d rather see.</p><p class="p1">“Marisa.”</p><p class="p1">She touched his arm and lightly kissed his cheek. “I didn’t realize you were in London!”</p><p class="p1">“I live here,” he said shortly.</p><p class="p1">“Of course… They let you keep the house, then?”</p><p class="p1">“No.”</p><p class="p1">“What a shame. And Thorold?”</p><p class="p1">“Stayed on at half pay.”</p><p class="p1">“Oh dear… But at least you didn’t have to let him go. I was so worried.”</p><p class="p2">Her blatant insincerity made him laugh. “Were you really? You did precious little to prevent it.”</p><p class="p1">She gave him a sour look, but then shook her head, smiling, as if he’d said something absurd. “I won’t explain myself to you.”</p><p class="p1">“There’s no need. I’m sure you had your reasons.” He cleared his throat and attempted a more civil tone. “I took a flat in Peckham.”</p><p class="p1">“Ah.” There was a moment’s pause before she added: “You’re so quick to take offense. I wasn’t asking as an insult.”</p><p class="p1">“I doubt that. I’ve rarely known you to open your mouth unless you think you can do some harm.”</p><p class="p1">“That’s very unfair.” With a pained expression, she looked down at her hands. “Asriel, I—please—will you walk with me?”</p><p class="p1">Reluctantly he followed her out into the gardens. Dusk was falling and the weather was unseasonably warm, and they walked for some time in silence. How he had once longed to walk with her like this, in the open air, where anyone might see! Now he only wished she’d go, before one of them did something regrettable. She brought him to a small Nipponese bridge, where dormant cherry trees lining the banks of a manmade stream prepared in secret for their April bloom. Leaning her forearms on the railing, she spoke, not to him so much as to the moon.</p><p class="p1">“I know what you must think,” she said. “You think I arranged it all somehow. Maybe you even think I put him up to it, that I sent him to kill you and Lyra, that I wanted you out of the way.”</p><p class="p1">“It had crossed my mind.”</p><p class="p1">“Naturally it would. I deserve it. You saw me betray Edward again and again—you must have thought, why should I not betray you as well? But I didn’t, Asriel. I swear it. I was—frightened, that’s all. I only wanted to protect myself. You can’t blame me for that. I was completely alone, hated and reviled everywhere I went. I had no choice but to distance myself from you, from the whole wretched affair, if I was to survive. Tell me you can understand.”</p><p class="p2">He had to admire her nerve, lying to his face about a matter of public record. She had placed glittering tears in her eyes the way other women wore diamonds, and trained them on him knowing they would cut. He thought of backing her over the red-lacquer handrail, of biting her throat and pinching her breasts and forcing her to cling to him or fall. Perhaps she hoped to goad him into doing this. He might have put an end to loving her, he thought with a familiar wave of despair, but nothing on heaven or earth would make him stop wanting her.</p><p class="p1">”I have to go,” he grunted, beginning to turn back the way they’d come.</p><p class="p1">“Wait, please,” she said, and her monkey dæmon grabbed for Stelmaria’s tail. The leopard snarled. “Do you hate me so much?”</p><p class="p1">He sucked in a breath to rebuke her, but she was too quick: she rose on tiptoe, caressed his face and kissed his lips. She was soft, intoxicatingly sweet, and when she leaned close he smelled the springtime on her skin. Automatically his hands went to her waist, his tongue went to her mouth, the bliss of being so near her flooded his senses. There was a new pain in him now, not the fortifying pain of anger but a strange urgent ache, like the pain just before the skin goes numb from cold.</p><p class="p1">“Tell me you hate me, then,” she murmured, shaking her head slowly from side to side, rubbing her mouth over his. “Say it, if it’s true.”</p><p class="p1">Catching his breath, he pressed his forehead to hers, and felt her panting under his hands.</p><p class="p1">“Not yet,” he whispered, still wanting to kiss her, already knowing from experience that path would end in Hell. As gently as he could, he pushed her away. “Not yet.”</p><p class="p2">“Another time, then.” A single perfect tear ran down her cheek, and she allowed it to hang briefly from her chin like a crystal ornament before it dropped and marred the pale satin of her gown. Wordlessly she brushed at her face and took the monkey by the hand, and they crossed the bridge without him.</p><p class="p1">He walked away and the ground was soft under his shoes. All around him, poking out of the waning snow, were the pale-green stalks of young jonquils.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This fic was inspired by "April 5th" by Talk Talk, and by a WIP by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/AFamiliarWitch/">@AFamiliarWitch</a>. The line "tell me you hate me" is hers, and she very graciously gave her permission for me to use it here. :)</p><p>It was written for the 30+ Fanfic Discord's Spring Equinox Challenge.</p><p>Jonquils represent renewed desire in the Language of Flowers.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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